“Kanshi’s Part-Time Job Diaries ~The Superhero Show~ / Kanshi’s Part-Time Job Diaries ~The Side Job~”
What They Say:
Morihito Otogi, a high school student who comes from a lineage of ogres, enjoys a peaceful, ordinary life until his childhood friend, Nico, moves in with him. Nico is a witch-in-training and chooses Morihito to be her familiar.
While Nico is thrilled to reunite with her old friend and crush, Morihito is tasked with the perilous duty to protect her from a foretold calamity. Between the unpredictable chaos caused by Nico’s magic, and the awkwardness of sharing a home, their lives become a whirlwind of supernatural hijinks and threats.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Based on the manga of the same name that launched in 2021, Witch Watch has been one of those series that has felt like it is powered by the sun in terms of its presence ahead of its launch. The original manga from Kenta Shinohara has powered through a ton of volumes since its debut, released in English through Viz Media, and having loved their Sket Dance series, it made me curious as to how this would work. The anime has a solid team behind it, with Hiroshi Ikehata directing it from the scripts overseen by Deko Akao. Bibury Animation has worked on some really interesting projects. The series is also seeing streaming through a couple of services which definitely helps expands its reach as well and will likely create a push toward the manga – which is the goal of every adaptation.
I’ll admit, an episode largely focused on Kanshi with two different split stories isn’t something that’s going to get me excited. Kanshi’s not as bad as some other characters that are introduced in shows like this, and we were “lucky” in that it took several episodes before he arrived. And even then he’s been used kind of sparingly, i.e. not in every episode and constantly there. With this episode, the dude has overspent and doesn’t have the money he needs in order to pay his part to stay at Morihito’s place as he has been. And Morihito, good guy that he is, isn’t going to let it slide easily because there are always short and quick jobs you can make some money on. It just requires effort and, well, Kanshi’s not adverse to it, but it’s not his preference as you can imagine. Squander your allowance, pay the price. Morihito is certainly right on this at this age for all of them. I can even imagine him nudging Nico in the same way if it were her in this situation.
The first half has him taking on playing a superhero kind of character gig, which is definitely a good one for him since he’s pretty acrobatic, but we do get some decent minor moments of character background for him and see how he helps another person in the show – which honestly makes Morihito really proud when he overhears it. It’s a good piece showing what kind of person Kanshi is and how he wants to help others. The back half shifts Kanshi to doing a different kind of job where he’s doing a side job at home picking and packing things. Nico tries to help by speeding him up so he can get done faster, but it just puts him on a different view of the world that freaks him out. There is a lot more situational comedy in this story than the first, since it’s at home for most of it, and the trio play off each other well, but I love that it’s still just terribly bad for Kanshi with the actual work itself, because the magic doesn’t help in reality. It’s a good batch of physical comedy moments and great reaction material – especially how horrifying the entire situation is from Kanshi’s point of view with people who are moving slower than him now.
In Summary:
Witch Watch has a good bit of fun here, even if Kanshi isn’t a character I have a lot of enjoyment from. He’s a good character and person as we’ve seen before, and this expands on that, but just some of his personality quirks aren’t my thing when I’m more of a mellow type. It’s been a plus that he’s largely been used sparingly in the show, so when we do get an episode like this, it doesn’t feel overwhelming, and they do a good mix of character growth material and just straightforward silliness – with an edge of horror. This was cute and a lot of fun, and again highlights just how dangerous magic is in this world.
Grade: B
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
